240 AUDUBON 



tained no material injury, until nature at length resumed 

 her wonted aspect. For some moments I felt undeter- 

 mined whether I should return to Morgantown, or attempt 

 to force my way through the wrecks of the tempest. My 

 business, however, being of an urgent nature, I ventured 

 into the path of the storm, and after encountering innu- 

 merable difficulties, succeeded in crossing it. I was 

 obliged to lead my horse by the bridle, to enable him to 

 leap over the fallen trees, whilst I scrambled over or under 

 them in the best way I could, at times so hemmed in by 

 the broken tops and tangled branches as almost to become 

 desperate. On arriving at my house, I gave an account 

 of what I had seen, when, to my astonishment, I was 

 told there had been very little wind in the neighbor- 

 hood, although in the streets and gardens many branches 

 and twigs had fallen in a manner which excited great 

 surprise. 



Many wondrous accounts of the devastating effects of 

 this hurricane were circulated in the country after its oc- 

 currence. Some log houses, we were told, had been over- 

 turned and their inmates destroyed. One person informed 

 me that a wire sifter had been conveyed by the gust to a 

 distance of many miles. Another had found a cow lodged 

 in the fork of a large half-broken tree. But, as I am dis- 

 posed to relate only what I have myself seen, I shall not 

 lead you into the region of romance, but shall content 

 myself with saying that much damage was done by this 

 awful visitation. The valley is yet a desolate place, over- 

 grown with briers and bushes, thickly entangled amidst 

 the tops and trunks of the fallen trees, and is the resort of 

 ravenous animals, to which they betake themselves when 

 pursued by man, or after they have committed their 

 depredations on the farms of the surrounding district. I 

 have crossed the path of the storm at a distance of a 

 hundred miles from the spot where I witnessed its fury, 

 and again, four hundred miles farther off, in the State of 



